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The following few posts will be about a sermon I read from The Blessing of God: Previously Unpublished Sermons of Jonathan Edwards. The sermon is entitled, The Way to Obtain the Blessing of God is Not to Let God Go Except He Bless Us. He based it on the account of Jacob’s wrestling with God and asking for a blessing in Genesis 32:26-29,

Then he said, “Let me go, for the day has broken.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” And he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” Then he said, “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed.” Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And there he blessed him. The bottom line message of the sermon is that there is a persistency and fervor we should nurture and develop in seeking after God for the blessings we desire from Him, and He will grant them if we don’t lose heart. First and foremost, Edwards’ concern is with the best blessing of all: the new birth. But he doesn’t limit it to that, which is the part I’m trying to figure out in my life and theology. There’s a very fine line between the promise of Psalm 1, “In everything he does, he prospers” and the idea that God always gives everything we want to us when we ask for it, and that suffering isn’t to be a normal part of the Christian’s life (John 16:33, 2 Timothy 3:12-13). Whoever wrote this on the Wikipedia entry on Prosperity theology said it well: While some proponents claim that [Prosperity theology's] ultimate purpose is the funding of evangelism and Christian charity throughout the world, critics argue that the teaching actually is a teaching of materialism masquerading as theology. Futhermore, it seems to promote more self-gratification than true spirituality. True enough, and there’s no doubt in my mind that this happens. Even so, I still get back to 2 Corinthians 9:10-11, because it outlines the thing that the “critics” above argue against. He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. That includes material blessings! I find myself somewhere in the middle of this, feeling the pull in both directions. This doesn’t mean I’m balanced; it means that I see the reasonableness of both positions and haven’t chosen one or harmonized both satisfactorily in my mind. On the one hand, I know that God is the supreme treasure of my life and that even if He kills me, yet I will hope in Him (Job 13:15). On the other, I know that He is a God of immeasurable abundance and that He blesses us so that we may be a blessing to others, and that doesn’t exclude material blessings! Edwards’ sermon has helped me get a better grip on walking this fine line. It must be walked, in my opinion, especially if you’re an American Christian. You can’t ignore either side of this equation and side with just one. There’s tension, the tension that true Christians know all too well because we do not understand fully, only in part right now. Therefore if you’re interested in what Edwards has to say, I will give you an outline of what he says and labor over each point in the next four posts. It is proper, he says, that we obtain the blessing of God by not letting Him go until He blesses us because: 1. it shows to us the value of the thing we’re asking from Him. It makes us sensibly aware of the great benefit we will have if we receive what we’re asking from Him, 2. it causes us to examine ourselves and see if there’s anything in us that would give God a cause to deny us the blessing, thereby causing us to seek the blessing in a humble — not demanding — demeanor, 3. it makes us realize that only God can truly give us this blessing, that He is the source of it, and makes us all the more earnest in prayer and dependency on Him, and finally, 4. it shapes and fashions us so that when we receive it, we’re in a right state to acknowledge Him to be the reason we’ve received it instead of solely our own ingenuity and not make a god out of the thing we’ve requested. I will begin with #1 within a few days.